by Hugh Thomas
Further debates were held in June 1806. Fox and Grenville then moved, in the lower and upper houses respectively, resolutions which pledged Parliament to abolish the slave trade “with all practicable expedition.” Both houses were persuaded also to urge the government to negotiate with other countries in order to achieve a general abolition of the traffic: British abolition would lead to an international British crusade. The recent death of Pitt, and the sword of Damocles hanging over Dundas, cast a shadow over the debates. In the Lords, the new lord chancellor, the brilliant but mercurial Thomas Erskine, redeemed the dismissive comments of his predecessor, Thurlow, in 1792, by saying, first, that he had personally changed his mind in favor of abolition, and that “it was our duty to God and to our country, which was the morning star of enlightened Europe and whose boast and glory was to grant liberty and life, and administer humanity and justice to all nations, to remedy that evil.” So a motion in favor of abolition was carried in both houses, by 114 to 15 in the Commons, and 41 to 20 in the Lords. The debates showed, Canning wrote enthusiastically, “what a government can do if it pleases.”31
An act was quickly passed enacting that, after August 1807, no new ships should be employed in the slave trade. In the debate in the House of Commons, Isaac Gascoyne, declared that he had no doubt that, after the abolition, “great distress, public and private, will follow . . . and that a number of our most loyal, industrious and useful subjects will emigrate to America.” Wilberforce introduced the argument that, were the slave trade to be abolished, planters would be constrained to look after their slaves much better; indeed, “to do everything which was likely to have the effect of increasing the population”—a point further stressed by Henry Petty, who said, “Where provisions are abundant and labor not excessive, the natural population of every place will answer its demands.” George Rose, a member of Parliament for Christchurch, an old ally of Clarkson and agent for Dominica, yet who had a financial interest in the continuing traffic in slaves, thought that there was a danger that abolition of the trade would lead to the emancipation of the slaves: “I can think of no man living, who looks at the matter without prejudice, who can be of the opinion that the negroes will be in a better state after emancipation than they are at present.” He even refused to think that the middle passage was “a period of misery; now one half of the evidence shews it to be very different.”32, XIII
Grenville, in the Lords, percipiently asked, “Can we flatter ourselves that the mischief which [the slave trade] has created will not be remembered for many ages, to our reproach?” He piously hoped that “we shall never be the objects” of slavery. He also thought that “we are really inexcusable” for not having abolished the trade long before. He pointed out that the trade was the worse because it was “not founded in necessity.” Those who justified the slave trade said that the Africans had condemned the men to be slaves: by that assertion, “we are made the executioners of the inhuman cruelties of the inhabitants of Africa.”33
Grenville as prime minister then felt able, in January 1807, by a most curious chance the same month as the Congress of the United States took its similar step, to introduce a bill for full abolition in the Lords. This stated that the trade was “contrary to the principles of justice, humanity and sound policy.” In his speech on the second reading, Grenville spoke of the trade as not only detestable but “criminal”—an interesting adjective for a prime minister to use in relation to something which had been supported by governments of Britain for many generations. Since he was a peer, he had to initiate the bill in the House of Lords; but, given the past hostility of that house to abolition, that arrangement was perhaps as well. His bill declared that “all manner of dealing and trading in the purchase, sale, barter or transfer of slaves . . . on, in, at, to or from any part of the coast of Africa” be prohibited. The envisaged punishments were similar to those specified in the United States: a malefactor would in future have to pay £100 for every slave found on board, as well as suffer the confiscation of the ship concerned. Grenville argued that abolition was necessary to ensure the survival of the older Caribbean colonies: “Are they not now distressed by the accumulation of produce on their hands, for which they cannot find a market? And will it not be adding to their distress . . . if you suffer the continuation of further importations?”34
There was, of course, still opposition: not only from the duke of Clarence, but also from Lords Westmorland, Saint Vincent (at that time the supreme commander of the navy), and Hawkesbury, of whom the first, furious at Wilberforce, said, with too much candor for comfort, that many of the noble lords owed their seats in that upper house to the slave trade. Hawkesbury wanted to suppress the words “contrary to the principles of justice [and] humanity,” in the text of the bill, and simply leave “contrary to sound policy” as the theme of the bill. One royal duke, that of Gloucester, a liberal and old acquaintance of Wilberforce’s, spoke in favor of abolition (he later became president of the Africa Institution).35 The bill passed (100 to 34), and then went to the Commons. There Sir Charles Pole, groom of the bedchamber to the duke of Clarence, an admiral, said that the “immediate abolition of the slave trade would be the most barbarous proceeding even to the negro himself.” He spoke as member of Parliament for Plymouth, a port which had scarcely taken part in the slave trade, but the naval tradition there was strong. T. W. Plummer, member for Yarmouth in the Isle of Wight (“little Bacchus Plummer,” according to the diarist Creevey), who had been in shipping—his firm was the agent for Lady Holland’s Jamaican plantation—said that he was as much an advocate of liberty as any man, but thought it was dangerous to propagate such ideas “among a people so unintelligent and so easily provoked to revolt as the negroes.” A new London member, George Hibbert, chairman of the West India Dock, member for Seaford, who had once traded in slaves himself and had property in Jamaica, insisted that more acts of cruelty occurred every week in London than in a month in Jamaica. Thomas Hughan, member for Dundalk, and one of Ireland’s few West Indian merchants, said that the bill was “fraught with ruin to the colonies and to the empire.” William Windham, then secretary for war and colonies, was the only member of the administration who opposed abolition; he said that it was not the time to embark “on such a dangerous experiment.” John Fuller, member for Sussex, one of the richest and most boisterous county members, who had opposed abolition continually, said, “We might as well say, ‘Oh, we will not have our chimney swept, because it is a little troublesome to the boy.’ ” Despite such trenchant, candid opposition, the bill passed on February 23 by 283 to 16, for the first time with a large number of members voting. The final debate was remarkable for an elegant comparison by Sir Samuel Romilly between Napoleon and Wil-berforce; at the end of it, the whole house rose to give the latter unprecedented applause. He deserved it: Wilberforce’s achievement is one of the most remarkable examples of the triumph of an individual statesman on a major philanthropic issue, and at the same time one more reminder that individuals can make history.36
The bill received royal assent on March 25. The trade was to be illegal from May 1, 1807.
There was, of course, discomfiture among the slave traders: for example, in Africa itself, Tucker and Gudgeon, on the river Sherbro; Crundell and Mason on the Gallinas; William Peel in Bullam; Goss in the Plantaines; and J. N. Dolz in Havana—not to speak of the Andersons, who had succeeded Richard Oswald and his friends as proprietors of Bence Island, opposite the estuary of the Sierra Leone. The African kings with whom the English had dealt so long could not believe the news: resentment on the Gold Coast even led to riots. Was not the slave trade the mainstay of Dahomey, Bonny, and Lagos, to say the least? The Atlantic slave trade had shaped too many African societies for the staple article in commerce to be so easily dropped overnight. The king of Bonny told Captain Hugh Crow of Liverpool in 1807, “We think that this trade must go on. That is the verdict of our oracle and the priests. They say that your country, however great, can never stop a trade ordained by God himsel
f.”37
Many ordinary petitions were also laid against this decision of the legislature of the world’s largest slave trader: for example, one from Joseph Marryat, member of Parliament for Horsham, a substantial West Indies merchant and father of “Captain Marryat,” the novelist. But they were to no avail. April 30, 1807, was the last date when a slaver legally sailed from a British port; and all the duke of Clarence, the future King William IV, could do was complain, “Lord Grenville, at one blow, destroys . . . the maritime strength of the nation.”38
James de Wolf, “Captain Jim,” also took a last slave voyage to Africa in 1807 in his ship the Andromache and then, foreseeing the likely ruin which would come to his town once slaving was abolished, invested his fortune in the Arkwright textile mills to the north of Providence.
It was widely supposed, since the British and the United States agreed about the matter, and since recent victories in war had given Britain control of so much of the Atlantic and the Caribbean, that the slave trade as such would soon be brought to an end. Grenville had said as much, when introducing his motion to abolish the trade: “Did not the noble lord [Eldon] see that, if we gave up the trade, it was not possible for any other state, without our permission, to take it up? Did we not ride everywhere unrivalled on the ocean?”39 The eloquent Henry Brougham, now moving to the center of the political stage, which he would often dominate, had argued in 1803 that, since “we have been the chief trader, I mean the ringleaders in the crime,” it was to be expected that British abolition would lead to imitation by other states.40 Alas, many tears were still to be shed, as some English opponents of abolition had anticipated, before the aspiration contained in those fine words could be fulfilled.
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IA “joe” was a “Johannes,” a gold coin of Portugal, called for King João, worth eight dollars at the time.
IISheridan had, however, in 1790 told the House of Commons that “he required no further information to convince him that the power possessed by the West India merchant over the slave was such that no man ought to have over another.”
IIIThis is the only roll call of voting members in the Houses of Commons and Lords on this issue which seems to have survived.
IVHe was father of Byron’s friend John Cam Hobhouse, but nephew of Isaac Hobhouse the slave trader of the first part of the eighteenth century.
VHigh society, meantime, was diverted by the song of the popular musician Ferrari, with words by the much-loved duchess of Devonshire, based on one of the most affecting incidents in Mungo Park’s Travels.
VILiverpool sent to Africa 135 ships a year between 1798 and 1802, carrying an average of 37,086 slaves a year; and 103 between 1803 and 1807, carrying 25,953 a year; compared with London’s mere eighteen and thirteen, and Bristol’s mere four and one respectively.
VIIFor example, the government confiscated the Lucy, belonging to Charles de Wolf. The surveyor of the port of Bristol was ordered to buy the ship for the government at a reasonable price. The day before the sale, the surveyor was visited by Charles and James de Wolf, with John Brown. They advised him not to go to the auction. The day of the auction, the surveyor was kidnapped by some of the de Wolfs’ seamen, and kept in hiding till the Lucy had been sold back to its old owner at a negligible price.
VIIIThe same year as the restoration of slavery, the entry of blacks into France was finally forbidden.
IXThe settled portion of “Louisiana” would be admitted to the Union as a state in 1812. The great stretch of land to the north and west became known as the “Missouri Territory.”
XThe independent Irish Parliament, “Grattan’s Parliament,” had come to an end after the Act of Union of 1800.
XIFor mismanagement of funds when treasurer of the navy.
XIIPitt was constrained to act because of an issue which had been raised during the shortlived previous administration, in 1801. Some investors pressed Lord Addington, when prime minister, to sell off the Crown lands in the recently acquired Trinidad and Saint Vincent, to increase government revenue and encourage the clearing of new land. That would have given an impetus to the slave trade there. Canning, speaking as a private member of Parliament, not as a minister, hoping to force the Addington administration out of office, warned the Commons of the risks of stocking Trinidad with slaves. He asked for a suspension of the plan to sell off the land, urging an agricultural reform by which Trinidad would become a model island. Addington backed down.
XIIIOf Rose at his death, John William Ward wrote, “I had grown accustomed to him in the House of Commons just as one grows accustomed to an old, clumsy, ill-contrived piece of furniture.”
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Book Six
THE ILLEGAL ERA
28
I See . . . We Have Not Yet Begun the Golden Age
“I see clearly that we have not yet begun the golden age.”
Tuscan diplomat, after the failure of the plans for suppressing the slave trade, at the conference of Aix-la-Chapelle, 1818
THE CONFUSION IN AFRICA after the abolition of the slave trade by Britain and the United States was considerable. In 1820, the king of Ashanti asked a British official, Dupuis, why the Christians did not want to buy slaves any more. Was their God not the same as that of the Muslims, who continued to buy, kidnap, and sell slaves just as they had always done? Since the Koran accepted slavery, some Muslims even persuaded themselves that the new Christian behavior was an attack on Islam.
Further, French, Portuguese, and even Spanish traders still acted as if they thought that slavery was ordained by God, just as the Anglo-Saxons had done up till 1807; though, of course, in the Napoleonic Wars, the first was an enemy of Britain, while the other two were allies.
It was years before these African attitudes began to change. There were, after all, more slaves in Africa in 1807 than in the Americas, even though there were also many more gradations of enslavement in the former. Mungo Park, traveling in Senegambia, had thought that “labour is universally performed by slaves”1 and guessed that “three-quarters of the population were slaves.” Probably slaves had constituted three-quarters of West African exports in the eighteenth century. “The slave trade has been at all times popular and is now,” commented an English businessman, John Hughes, after a visit to Cacheu-Bissau, or Portuguese Guinea, in 1828, adding, “I believe that every native African . . . would indulge in the slave trade if allowed to do so.”2
In the region of the rivers Sénégal and Gambia, much political power lay with the slave soldiers, the so-called ceddo, of the local aristocracies, who had from the early eighteenth century themselves gained wealth from selling slaves. The abolition of the Anglo-Saxon section of the European slave trade caused increased activity on the part of the ceddo, anxious to take advantage of what might seem the last days of the European interest in slaves; and the phenomenal rise, in the region of Senegambia, of the power of mullahs, at the expense not only of the ceddo but of noblemen and the temporal power, partly derived from the collapse of the European traffic. (These mullahs were at least as interested in slaving as their predecessors.) On the other hand, the emerging Sokoto caliphate in the Hausa city-states, a Sunni enterprise in the north of what is now Nigeria, was for a time hostile to the Atlantic slave trade. One leader there seems to have offered himself as a kind of “Muslim Wilberforce” to Africa in an attempt to stop the enslavement of free Muslims. But that prophet limited himself to saving his coreligionaries and anyhow he soon gave way to more traditional individuals, for whom slave trading and slave raiding were normal activities sanctioned by time and the Koran. The Hausa slave trade continued inland unabated, and about a quarter of the population of the caliphate may have been slaves at the end of the nineteenth century. Among the Ashanti, the most powerful of the kingdoms in Guinea, every man of property had slaves even if, since there were no plantations, their condition was more like being a member of “a family of friends.” The laboring people were still “mostly slaves” in the 1840s. “Many of the chiefs possess .
. . many thousands of slaves,” remarked the Reverend John Beecham, a Methodist missionary in the Gold Coast in 1843.3 Slaves were still sacrificed at the death of kings in West Africa, often in a dramatic fashion, and in the kind of numbers which would have excited the approval of the ancient Mexica: perhaps a thousand or more on the occasion of the death of the king of Ashanti in 1824. Slaves dominated the military in certain kingdoms. Even in European settlements, “castle slaves” who had worked in the forts, including those in Cape Coast, remained, receiving payments till they died: they had only rarely been subjected to the indignity of being shipped to the New World. In Dahomey, a French visitor thought that two-thirds of the population were slaves: a statement which admittedly loses much of its force if it be realized that some argued that the inhabitants of Dahomey were legally “all slaves to the king.”4
